Volunteering For A Bad Beat

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Gregstocke

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Let's say you've been smart. You've been patient. You folded away from stack-draining draws on exorbitant raises from the made hands of your opponents. You stayed away from marginal hands, unless you were in a streak. Your raises commanded some respect. You've made it through hundreds of other poker players by being disciplined and perceiving when the edge belonged to you. Suddenly, the big biscuits and gravy shows up, pocket rockets. You now take all that discipline, hard work, and savvy, and you go all-in! A larger stack than yours has you covered. They like their 99, so they call. When they hit that 3rd nine on the flop, well, life's not fair, is it? Do you know the real risk you took? Game over. No more hands. No final table. Cracked aces. Finito. If the blinds were not necessitating you to move all-in, but you had a degree of comfort, why risk it all like that.... like.... an... amateur, volunteering for a bad beat?
 
jazzaxe

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You have to realize that the situation might be calling for it. A chip advantage gives strength against a bigger hand with a chip problem. Preflop all ins against bigger stacks, you still have to know that if you don't improve you will be out. Not only against a lower pair but any draw that hits from two pair and up. AA is not a nut hand but the preflop odds always favor it.
 
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xGavin

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Play for 1st, not second. Cant be afraid of bad beats
 
2Pacavelli

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If you played the right way , there is nothing to regret . Poker is a risk game , you can't play you wanting to get away from bad beats , as this part of the game .
 
BobGrayling

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What better hand and situation did you want? AA all in and got a caller. I will take that every time if I can get it.

But, even an 80% advantage loses 1/5 of the time.

Any time I get mine in with the best of it, I'm happy. The rest will work out in the long run.
 
10058765

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I'd call it volunteering for a double up.
Slightly difference approach....
 
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If you think getting AA aipf in a tournament is not a good play then I don't know what to say.
 
Poker Orifice

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HERO gets it in with AA & is fortunate enough to have another player call him with 99... and he's made a mistake:confused: (< I'm confused)
 
S3mper

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Well to answer OP's question of why risk going all in with AA pre flop (Short stack or 5 betting or whatever the situation that got us all in is) because we are the favorite to win the hand. Yes we are putting our tournament life on the line but if your afraid to put your tournament on the line as a favorite (Afraid doesn't mean nervous but unwilling) then we can't expect to win.
 
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Gregstocke

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The thing none of you are getting

I wasn't short-stacked. I was top 3. A slower play on those aces would have yielded a loss, but a retention of my position. I didn't get to where I was by going all-in pre-flop. I got there methodically picking my spots and carefully ascertaining my edges. Next time you are approaching the final table, go all-in with that pocket pair. Maybe you'll win. But, if you don't, you're just fooling yourself saying there was no other way to play it.
 
Henry Minute

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I have to say that I would be unlikely to open shove with AA. Yes I'd raise, the amount would depend on the other players at the table but at least 3x.

The question is, what would you have done if another player had shoved, or made a large raise, before it got round to you. Would you have folded the AA? I very much doubt it. Either a re-raise or a shove, so the chances are that you would end up all-in anyway. Same result, different path.
 
Poker Orifice

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I have to say that I would be unlikely to open shove with AA. Yes I'd raise, the amount would depend on the other players at the table but at least 3x.

.

And if it seems clear that other(s) will call off the allin... won't you then go allin?
 
Poker Orifice

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I wasn't short-stacked. I was top 3. A slower play on those aces would have yielded a loss, but a retention of my position. I didn't get to where I was by going all-in pre-flop. I got there methodically picking my spots and carefully ascertaining my edges. Next time you are approaching the final table, go all-in with that pocket pair. Maybe you'll win. But, if you don't, you're just fooling yourself saying there was no other way to play it.


I'm not good enough to pass up 80/20 advantages pre.
Unless it's some crazy ICM situation with payouts being really skewed... not wanting to get my stack in preflop with AA would be crazy! (imo)
 
Kenzie 96

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Let's say you've been smart. You've been patient. You folded away from stack-draining draws on exorbitant raises from the made hands of your opponents. You stayed away from marginal hands, unless you were in a streak. Your raises commanded some respect. You've made it through hundreds of other poker players by being disciplined and perceiving when the edge belonged to you. Suddenly, the big biscuits and gravy shows up, pocket rockets. You now take all that discipline, hard work, and savvy, and you go all-in! A larger stack than yours has you covered. They like their 99, so they call. When they hit that 3rd nine on the flop, well, life's not fair, is it? Do you know the real risk you took? Game over. No more hands. No final table. Cracked aces. Finito. If the blinds were not necessitating you to move all-in, but you had a degree of comfort, why risk it all like that.... like.... an... amateur, volunteering for a bad beat?




Apparently one of us is unaware of the criteria for sustaining a bad beat. :confused:
 
S3mper

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I wasn't short-stacked. I was top 3. A slower play on those aces would have yielded a loss, but a retention of my position. I didn't get to where I was by going all-in pre-flop. I got there methodically picking my spots and carefully ascertaining my edges. Next time you are approaching the final table, go all-in with that pocket pair. Maybe you'll win. But, if you don't, you're just fooling yourself saying there was no other way to play it.

I'd say a 80% edge is a good spot to pick.. If you were top 3 and it knocked you out that means the player you were against was top 2.

Winning this pot would have increased your chances of winning the tournament significantly.

In order to be winning in MTT's we need to be finishing top 3 not just min cashing. I would be willing to GII with AA pre anytime. The only exception would be sattys where everyone is paid the same prize.
 
Henry Minute

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And if it seems clear that other(s) will call off the allin... won't you then go allin?
Obviously, if it develops into a 3-bet - 4-bet - 5-bet - etc. situation I would be only too happy to get it all-in pre. It's just that being a bit nitty I prefer not too automatically open shove. It is situational, of course, and if I was getting short I probably would shove but in this instance the OP was 3rd in chips.

You have to bear in mind, when reading the following, that I play in real donk-fests and my conclusions from doing so are that folk that shove A,A do so for the same reason that some do so with 3,3 or 2,2. They don't really want callers. The 3's do it because the probability is that with more than one caller they are less likely to win the hand. The A's (and I've asked several of them) frequently say something like "I've had AA cracked so many times that I really didn't want anyone to call me." Of course in higher stakes games people's thought processes will probably be different but I don't play in them.
 
TheBigFinn

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"Next time you are approaching the final table, go all-in with that pocket pair [AA]. Maybe you'll win. But, if you don't, you're just fooling yourself saying there was no other way to play it."

Wow! There are other ways to play AA, but sadly the are all inferior to pushing with any stack less than 20 big blinds. Say you raise 2.5BB with AA and get a single caller in the big blind. The flop comes 259 rainbow and the pot is 6.5BB. Its checked to you and you bet 4BB (~1/2 of the pot) and get one caller. The turn is a K. What do you do? You have 1/3 of your stack in and you don't know what to do. Check and call a 1/2 pot bet on the river? Bet and get called on the turn?

Suppose you check the flop and get the same K on the turn and villain pots the river. Do you fold? or call the 6.5BB? If you call you have 9BB in. If you fold it is true you only lose the opening bet, but how often have you folded the winning hand? Given away those chips how often will you have to take much worse odds to stay alive? What happens if you double up from 3rd place. How much easier will it be to put yourself into a position to win with that stack, making your future EV so much better?

David Sklansky came up with a solution, Sklansky Bucks. You win Sklansky Bucks making positive EV plays and over time Sklansky Bucks turn into real bucks.
 
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